36 



ADVENTURES IN SC L'TH AFRICA. 



Tlie rains having fallen, the country was already 

 adorned with a goodly coating of verdant grass, and 

 my oxen, having done little else than feed and rest 

 themselves for several months, were now full of spirit 

 and in fine condition, and rattled along before my heav- 

 ily-laden wagons, over rugged hills and through the 

 trackless mazes of the forest, at a rapid and willing 

 pace, and on the evening of the 4th of October I once 

 more formed my encampment at Lesausau, in the Ba- 

 mangwato Mountains, in the neighborhood of Sicomy's 

 kraal. 



Here I was quickly welcomed by Sicomy, who vis- 

 ited me in company with a numerous body of his tribe. 

 He expressed himself much gratified at seeing me re- 

 turn in safety from the dangerous pursuit in which I 

 had been employed, remarking that he was often anx- 

 ious about me in my absence, for, if any casualty had 



forests. It is chiefly remarkable on account of its extraordinary size, 

 actually resembling a castle or tower more than a forest-tree. Through- 

 out the couutiy of Bamangvvato the average circumference of these 

 trees was from thirty to forty feet ; but on subsequently extending my 

 researches in a northeasterly direction, throughout the more fertile for- 

 ests which clothe the boundless tracts through which the fair Limpopo 

 winds, I daily met with specimens of this extraf)rdinary tree averaging 

 from sixty to a hundred feet in circumference, and maintaining this 

 thickness to a height from twenty to thirty feet, when they diverge into 

 numerous goodly branches, whose general character is abrupt and hori- 

 zontal, and which seem to terminate with a peculiar suddenness. The 

 wood of this tree is soft and utterly unserviceable ; the shape of the leaf 

 !s similar to that of the sycamore-tree, but its texture partakes more of 

 the fig-leaf; its fruit is a nut, which in size and shape resembles the egg 

 of the swan. 



A remarkable fact, in connection with these trees, is the manner ia 

 which they are disposed throughout the forest. They are found stand- 

 ing singly, or in rows, invariably at considerable distances from one 

 another, as if planted by the hand of man ; and from their wondrous 

 size and unusual height (for they always tower high above their sur- 

 "rounding compeers), they convey the idea of being strangers or inter- 

 lopers on the ground they occupy. 



